Baiul had a more complex short program and she performed it flawlessly. Too bad she always planned a weak jumping routine for her long programs.

This was 1993. Five different triples was still a pretty big deal, not absolutely required for admission into the world top 10 or even medal contention. Yeah, a handful of the best jumpers (not necessarily best skaters, viz. Bonaly) had attempted six or seven with repeats, triple axels, or triple-triples. But just having one of each triple was still enough to get you noticed, not considered "weak."

Yes Lu Chen was 5th in the short, and that's the placement she deserved, but the Long Program counts for twice the amount of the short AND is the tiebreaker. So therefore, looking at my opinions of the performances:

BAIUL: 1st in the short, 4th in the long. Overall - 4.5 points.

BONALY: 3rd in the short, 3rd in the long. Overall - 4.5 points.

LU CHEN: 5th in the short, 1st in the long. Overall - 3.5 points.

KIELMANN: 8th in the short, 2nd in the long. Overall - 6 points.

Chen wins and then Bonaly gets Silver over Baiul because of the tiebreaker

I more or less agree with this but where would you have put Yuka Sato? She finished 4th and her LP wasn't too bad.

IMO Sato had one of the better long programs of the night (which is saying something, given how well many others skated); and she was certainly the only one out there who showed any amount of real SPEED at all.....

I just re-watched this on youtube and I must say, Nancy K is the biggest whiner in all of skating history... she drives me nuts...

As for the three medalists ~ Oksana had an "it" factor that went way beyond the judges... sheer magic on ice... was her technique perfect? no. But she worked those judges like no one else... how could she NOT win? As for Suyria, she is probably the most under-rated skater on the planet... I often wonder how different her career would've been if she'd skated for the US vs. France... the French had no idea what to do with her & allowed her to shoot herself in the foot time & time again... what a waste. If she competed today, she'd give these youngin's a run for their money...

But the podium that night worked out the right way... its too bad for Lu Chen, but what can you do?

I more or less agree with this but where would you have put Yuka Sato? She finished 4th and her LP wasn't too bad.

5th place in the long and overall. She has great speed and edges but for such a happy piece of music, the performance was a bit glum. Her jumping was pretty good but my top 3 choices all did more triples.

Then Kerrigan would be 6th place overall after that very disappointing performace (although it honestly wasn't any worse than her skate at Nationals, where she placed 1st).

Well I have to disagree with this mindset. If that's what the judges were thinking, they were simply wrong. Midori Ito had already set the standard of a 7 Triple program several years earlier. Any program with less than 7 Triples should have a lower base maximum score...at least 2/10 of a point per Triple not completed. Which means a 5 Triple program should never receive more than a 5.6 (unless there were a Triple Axle, Quad, or a very hard jump combination in there). That should have been Baiul's "base" score for her technical routine - a 5.6 if she did it perfectly. It's even nice to assume a 5.6 as her base considering she didn't do any combination jumps that included a triple. Taking 5.6 as her max and then deducting .1 for the minor mistakes she made, 5.5 should have been her technical score at both the 1993 Worlds and 1994 Olympics.

Well I have to disagree with this mindset. If that's what the judges were thinking, they were simply wrong. Midori Ito had already set the standard of a 7 Triple program several years earlier. Any program with less than 7 Triples should have a lower base maximum score...at least 2/10 of a point per Triple not completed. Which means a 5 Triple program should never receive more than a 5.6 (unless there were a Triple Axle, Quad, or a very hard jump combination in there). That should have been Baiul's "base" score for her technical routine - a 5.6 if she did it perfectly. It's even nice to assume a 5.6 as her base considering she didn't do any combination jumps that included a triple. Taking 5.6 as her max and then deducting .1 for the minor mistakes she made, 5.5 should have been her technical score at both the 1993 Worlds and 1994 Olympics.

That's not how the long program marking worked under 6.0 that's how it worked int he SP but in the LP it was only what you did, not waht you didn't do.

That's not how the long program marking worked under 6.0 that's how it worked int he SP but in the LP it was only what you did, not waht you didn't do.

Once again - that doesn't make any sense. They specifically had rules that stated a max of 7 Triples. Anything less than that logically has to mean inferior and therefore deserving of a lower rating. Otherwise what is the point. Are you judging the technical merit of the skater or not?

And in any case "what you did and what you didn't do" are exactly the same thing. If you DID 5 Triples then you still DIDN'T do two others that could have been completed.

What they do say is that only two triples could be repeated. Therefore, if you had three different kinds of triples, the maximum total you could do legally would be five. If you had five different kinds, the maximum you could do would be seven. If you had six different, you could legally do eight.

However, even in the early nineties and also more recently when a few women were doing triple axels, I don't believe any of them ever maxed out the jump content with eight legal triples. They would only repeat one, or none, or double or leave out one of the other takeoffs. What was impressive was not that they were doing the maximum *number* of jumps, but that they were doing the hardest jump and possibly all the different kinds.

So which would be more impressive, six total triples of six different kinds (including triple axel), or six total triples of four different kinds?

How about one each of six kinds, or one each of five kinds with two repeats for a total of seven, but no triple axel?

How about seven achieved by repeating two with double toe on the end, vs. six total including a triple-triple?

How about seven attempted, including a triple-triple, but poor quality (small, or some of them cheated, or flutzed lutzes, or off-balance or two-foot landings), vs. one of each executed well?

How about six triples and a cheated quad (as Bonaly had already attempted before 1993)?

Obviously the maximum possible jump content considering only triples would have included 8 triples with two triple axels, two triple lutzes, and at least one triple-triple combination. As of 1993 no woman had ever attempted that in one program, much less succeeded. In fact, no one has done so as of 2006. But it would have been legal all along.

I don't know what specific judges were looking for in 1993. Likely the answer was different for different judges.

For me as a fan at the time, what got me to take a competitor seriously as a contender was having all five of the non-axel triples. To distinguish herself from the other competitors with that arsenal, something extra would be necessary. That something extra *might* be repeating two of the triples, but it could come in other areas besides jumps. In Baiul's case, her extras were mainly in the areas of the second mark.

Once again - that doesn't make any sense. They specifically had rules that stated a max of 7 Triples. Anything less than that logically has to mean inferior and therefore deserving of a lower rating. Otherwise what is the point. Are you judging the technical merit of the skater or not?

Whether it makes sense or not those were the rules...and there cetainly was not any rule saying the maximum number of jumps was 7...how were the men knocking out 8 triples a quad if that's the case? The Zayak rule meant that you could do every triple you had in your arsenal and repeat two so long as they were in combination, but you could double jump til you were were blue in the face since there was no restriction on the number of jumping passes.

Originally Posted by Zuranthium

And in any case "what you did and what you didn't do" are exactly the same thing. If you DID 5 Triples then you still DIDN'T do two others that could have been completed.

6.0 was not an absolute scoring system it was comparative - the marks were place holders. The skaters in 1993 were not being judged against what Ito 9or anyone esle for that matter) had done years before - they were being judged against each other. In order to get the right place holder a judge can give the skater any mark s/he wants, its the placement that counts. Going back to an example of Elvis Stojko i used in another thread getting a 6.0 in tech i think at '95 worlds despite stepping out of his quad toe was because the french judge has left him/herself no choice having given Candeloro a 6.0 for the presentation mark and needed to mark Stojko so high in the tech to get him to come out first where he should have been.

Oksana had an "it" factor that went way beyond the judges... sheer magic on ice...

I totally agree. I even remember how I felt after seeing Oksana skate at that competition. I told Mr. RG that this girl was the most exciting skater I'd seen in many years. There was something very special about her, something you just couldn't really put into words.

Dont forget politics, especially before an olympic year, the Russian federation and the Ukrainian federation had been "in bed for years" so dont kid yourself, thats how she won both gold medals. No way she deserved the Liilihammer gold and it was the Russinan influenced judges who once again denied an American skater a gold medal.

The funny thing is Lu had a clean short and still finished only 5th in the short. The level of skating was so extremely high in the womens short you could come in as one of the only 2 returning World medalists, skate a clean short with a triple lutz combo and come only 5th in the short.